


The Days that Follow

by hollyhawke



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Post Star Trek: Into Darkness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-06
Updated: 2013-08-06
Packaged: 2017-12-22 15:29:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/914881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hollyhawke/pseuds/hollyhawke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leonard may have been the only one with the medical expertise to save Jim, but the rest of the command staff wasn't about to let him do it alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Days that Follow

**Author's Note:**

> I have a deep fondness for the crew-as-a-family dynamic, and I feel pretty strongly that the Enterprise crew would have done their best to look out for each other after the events of Into Darkness. I try to portray that here. [crossposted on Tumblr at hollyhawke.tumblr.com]
> 
> Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy! Any feedback you'd like to leave is appreciated.

“You aren’t alone, you know.”

Leonard hadn’t even heard anyone enter the room, but when he turns, he’s faced with Carol Marcus. She’s on crutches, the doctor in him notes absently; her leg must have been damaged enough to require more than a few rounds with the osteo regenerator, although she’s lucky to have been treated this quickly. He frowns the tiniest bit, making a mental note to pull up her file the next time...well, sometime.

“Doctor Marcus,” he says in a clipped, angry tone. “What can I do for you?”

She flinches almost indiscernibly and Leonard could kick himself.

“Carol,” she says. “I said, you aren’t alone.” There’s something in her tone that sounds like a challenge, like she’s daring him to argue.

Leonard narrows his eyes.

“Of course I’m not,” he agrees. “You’re here in the room with me.”

Interpreting her statement so literally is something Spock would do, and Leonard clears his throat. He’s dodging the point, and they both know it.

Carol huffs and rolls her eyes, not even pretending to hide it. “Doctor McCoy,” she says, drawing in a breath, “If you really think that the crew of the Enterprise is going to leave you alone to work until you drop trying to synthesize this serum, I regret to inform you that you are sorely mistaken.”

Leonard simply stares at her for a moment. “Doctor – Carol,” he hastily corrects himself, carefully curbing his irritation, “I am uniquely qualified, you can’t expect me to let _anyone_ else do this, this is Jim we’re talking about –“

“Of course not,” Carol cuts him off indignantly. “I don’t mean that. But you are not going to lock yourself in here and take stims until you collapse. You will eat, you will rest, periodically, and you will let me assist you with the lab work.” Leonard opened his mouth to argue, but Carol continued. “I was on track to study astrobiology, Doctor McCoy, before my father convinced me to study weaponry. I know my way around a lab, and even you cannot deny that this will be easier – and faster – with an extra set of hands. I will even wash your glassware, but _you will let me help you._ ”

Leonard’s mouth is still open. Finally, he shuts it, and chokes out an agreement. Next thing he knows, Carol has spun on her heels and left the room, leaving him staring after her, shaking his head bemusedly.  
It was all they could do to get Jim stabilized in a cryo tube before the Enterprise docked and its crew shuttled back to Earth, but in the few hours that have passed since then, Leonard has badgered his way into one of the most state of the art labs of Starfleet Medical and made himself at home.

When Carol returns, she’s got a hypo in one hand and a plate of food in the other. She sets the plate in front of him without a word, but withholds the hypo. Leonard isn’t remotely hungry, but he obliges her. She has a point; if he can’t function, he can’t do anything to help Jim. She doesn’t have the medical clearance to obtain a hypo, he’s pretty sure, but he doesn’t say anything about that either.

 

 

Carol spends the next day in administrative debriefings and hearings; Leonard is aware by now that she forged transfer papers onto the Enterprise, so he carefully puts out of his mind that there are consequences for that sort of behavior and concentrates on his work. The next day, she spends in restorative surgery for her knee, followed, Leonard assumes, by several rounds of osteo-regenerative therapy.

But Leonard isn’t alone. Spock comes by on what Leonard can only assume is his lunch break, looking tenser than Leonard has ever seen him. He’s been in debriefings all day, he mentions tersely, but mostly he helps Leonard in silence, handing him slides and reagents and glassware without comment. Although Leonard would never admit it, he’s a stellar lab assistant.

“I must return,” Spock announces stiffly, stepping away from the lab bench. It’s the most he’s said since he arrived, and Leonard just nods.

“Thanks, Spock,” he murmurs, hardly pulling his eyes away from the microscope. Then he straightens up, and turns to face him.

After a heavy pause, he says quietly, “You didn’t call me.”

Leonard caught the tiniest of flinches contorting the corners of Spock’s eyes.

“No,” he agrees softly. “And I am sorry, Doctor.”

Leonard knows he should be seeing red, spitting fire, and _raging_ at Spock for taking away his chance. Whether that chance would have been to save Jim, or say goodbye to him, Leonard would never be sure.

He tries to dredge up some anger, but he can’t manage it, not when he feels so heavy, so he just nods and turns back to his work.

 

 

Uhura comes in Carol’s stead with a plate of food once her own debriefings are over for the day, but perches on a lab stool instead of attempting to assist him. She reminds him of a bird, and the thought makes him smile for the first time in what feels like – what has been – days.

“Spock’s worried,” she confides in him, “Or as worried as I’ve ever seen him, I suppose. He wishes he could be here, helping, you know.”

“I wish he could, too,” agrees Leonard, voice cracking. The project is too classified for all but the most senior of command staff and the admiralty; most of them are tied up in debriefings and hearings, like Spock. In theory, with Jim stabilized cryogenically, there isn’t medical cause to rush, but that doesn’t appease Leonard any.

“I wish I could do more to help you,” says Uhura pensively. “I’m no scientist,” she adds, looking wistfully at the array of microscopes and instruments throughout the lab.

“Do you know what Starfleet will have to say about all this?” she asks, waving a hand to indicate the room at large. Leonard winces.

“No,” he answers, “But I’m sure this violates all sorts of medical ethics, and I’d just as soon get this done before they figure that out, too.” He pauses. “I’m trying not to think about it too much.”

They sit in a comfortable silence before Uhura slides off the stool, landing gracefully on her feet. She approaches Leonard and lays a hand on his shoulder, even though she already has his full attention.

“Let me know if there’s anything I can do for you,” she says.

“ _Anything_.”

Leonard nods, swallowing the implications of that, but before he can thank her, she presses a kiss to the top of his head and steps away.

“Take care of yourself, Leonard.”

 

 

Carol’s return doesn’t stop the rest of the senior command staff from finding an excuse to stop by. As promised, she forcefully ensures that he remains hydrated, fed, and relatively well-rested. Although he complains, he’s grateful. A small part of him is sure that without her – and the rest of his visitors – he would have cracked open by now.

Chekov and Sulu stop by with news from the debriefings and hearings – it has been decided, Sulu tells him with more hope in his face than anyone else Leonard has spoken to – that they will all remain stationed on the Enterprise – including Carol. And during the repairs, there will be mandatory shore leave, after which the ship is scheduled to return to duty in approximately a year. Leonard tunes him out after that; there won’t be shore leave for him unless Jim can take it with him. He does notice that Chekov is unusually subdued, but Sulu’s hand on his elbow seems to stop him from saying anything.

 

 

Scotty’s visit is the most heartbreaking.

“I should have stopped him,” is the first thing that comes tumbling out of his mouth.

Leonard sighs, resisting the urge to cradle his head in his hands, because how he _wished_ Scotty could have, somehow.

“No,” he says slowly. “I know Jim. Once he’s made up his mind....there ain’t a power in the ‘verse that can stop him.”

Scotty smiles weakly, but he’s choking on tears. “Stubborn pain in the ass, he is.” Somehow, the attempt at bravado is more wearing than the outright sorrow, and Leonard forces a smile that comes out as a grimace. It isn’t long before Scotty excuses himself, to the relief of them both.

 

 

Much later, when he and Carol are poring over slides, she sits up and stretches, her spine cracking audibly. Leonard looks up from his own microscope to raise an eyebrow at her, and she sighs.

“I wish Christine were here,” she murmurs, rubbing at her eyes. She should have – and could have – gone to bed hours ago, Leonard realizes. It’s well after midnight.

“Christine?” he asks. It sounds familiar, but he can’t place the name.

“Friend of mine from the Academy,” she answers. “She’s serving on some godforsaken starbase on the outer frontier these days –“

“Oh, Christine Chapel!” says Leonard. “She was on the medical staff during, well, that mess.” There was no need to ask what he was referring to.

“That’s her,” confirms Carol, smiling. “I don’t know how long you knew her, but she’s wonderful in the lab. She’d be of much more to you than I am.”

“I’ll comm her,” Leonard says decisively, “and request her transfer to the Enterprise. If she’s willing, of course.”

Carol beams, and Leonard can’t help but to feel a little lighter.

 

 

It’s after a few hours of sleep on the ancient cots set up in the corner of the lab that Leonard thinks he’s finally perfected the serum. He holds up a full vial of it, admiring it. Carol leans on the lab bench and rests her chin in her hands, grinning openly.

“I’ll need Spock to verify my results,” Leonard says automatically, but he can’t quite contain the hope rising in his gut. Carol isn’t even trying. He knows the future is far from rosy –this serum still has to work, Jim still has to recover, and he’s sure there will be medical hearings for him, never mind the stim withdrawals he’s probably facing. But he has a tube of serum in his hands, and it’s everything.

“Congratulations, Doctor McCoy,” murmurs Carol.

He shakes his head, at a loss for words. She pulls a hypo out of her jacket pocket and holds it out to him. It’s a sedative.

“Go rest,” she says gently. “I’ll comm Spock and get him down here to take a look, and when you wake up, the two of you can discuss it.”

Leonard opens his mouth to protest, but Carol shushes him.

“You’ve earned it,” she says. “And we’ve been worried about you, you know that? The crew loves the captain, of course, but we’ve hardly forgotten about you, Leonard. We care about you.”

Leonard stares at her for a moment. A week ago, he hadn’t even known this woman, but in that week, she’d saved his life – probably more than once. A lot of things had been different a week ago , and he’s glad, he acknowledges, that she’ll still be posted on the Enterprise. He might like to get to know her better, when the stakes aren’t so high.

There are lot of things he might like to do when the stakes aren’t so high, but he has a lot of work to do before then. He accepts the hypo from Carol, considering her words. He’ll remember them a year later, when Jim welcomes her to the Enterprise with the word “family.”


End file.
